<Begin Segment 23>

RP: Did the topic of camp ever come up?

FH: No. And for Memorial Day I used to make the... one of the growers that grew for whoever I worked for, Robert Hall, grew miniatures. And I asked him, George Tara, if there was the discards of the miniature heads, miniature carnation head that, if he was gonna throw away, I would like it. So on Memorial Day I made these little leis and put it on the graves. And Chiyo would come by and see me making them, and she would say, "What are you doing?" And I'd say, "Oh, I'm making these little leis, not a big lei, but a little lei to put on the stone, to put on the graves," and she said, "When I die will you put it on my grave?" I said, "Oh, Chiyo, you're not gonna die for a while. Why are you worried about that?" "No, when I die, I want you to put leis on my grave," so I, she's gone. I don't make a lei; I do visit her grave, both her and, Fred and Chiyo's grave. Beside Joe's mother and father, they're up together, buried together in Eternal Young Oceanside, and I do, but she'd always say, "I want one of those on my grave when I pass on." It was so sweet of her. But see, now flowers are hard to get hold of, so that's... and time is essence. Takes a lot of time to make those little leis.

RP: And then your, since you left camp, have you returned to Manzanar?

FH: Several times. Several times. I've taken my grandsons, my two older grandsons, up to Bridgeport like I told you, and on the way back in that guardhouse, I signed my name in Japanese, Hayashi, and I also wrote Fergashi on there, and that's... my daughter is married to Ferguson, so we took Fergie and Hayashi and made Fergashi, and we put Fergashi in there, so if you go inside and you see Fergashi, that's what we put in there. That was our mark. Our graffiti, so to speak. [Laughs] And we, I was there, the last time I was there was that, when we had the opening event. How long ago was that?

RP: 2004.

FH: Oh, 2004. Gosh, five years ago. But anyhow, I was there and that's the last time I was there. But every, every year we went camping up, up to that High Sierra area and we stop by. One year we stopped by at the Independence, and it wasn't too much longer that they moved a lot of the stuff back into this Manzanar area, didn't they? Is that still there?

RP: The museum in Independence is still there.

FH: Is still there.

RP: But we never actually moved stuff from that museum into...

FH: Oh, that was when Shiro Nomura put up.

RP: Shiro, exactly. That's Shiro's exhibit. It stays there.

FH: There, okay. I was under the impression that maybe you had brought something down.

RP: Did you share your story with your kids when they were growing up, or is it difficult for you to do that?

FH: You know what, I've shared my story with so many kids here, that went to school here. Like, their assignment is something important in World War II, and they come to me and ask me... I don't know how many I've done. I've done several, and they always come back saying, "I made A-plus on it." It, one on one kind of a story, I guess that makes a world of difference, instead of something that Grandpa had said, but Grandpa's gone and, you know, whatever... or Grandma said, or -- yes?

KP: So I wanted to kind of bring this back together, when you first went to Manzanar as a teenager you thought you were going camping.

FH: Yeah, uh-huh.

KP: So then you went on to actually really go camping in the Sierra afterwards.

FH: Yeah.

KP: Do you think that was trying to...

FH: Yeah, I sort, I feel like I still have that tie there. I mean, it's a total different tie, but it's still a tie there. And you know, a lot of us have, are doing that yet. And like my grandkids, I've taken my grandkids -- they're married and they have the children -- they say, "We want to go back up there and do that again," but I'm gettin' up in my age, so... but my mind's saying I want to go, but maybe my body won't say. I don't know.

KP: I have one other question about back in camp. It sounds like you got around and knew where a lot of different people lived. I was wondering if you remember a hakujin woman who lived with her papa, daughter and their family? The name, family name was Miyamoto, and the woman's name was Adelaide.

FH: No. No, I don't remember.

RP: One other location in camp that was a very, sort of a magnet for drawing people was the big park, community park called Pleasure Park.

FH: What was that?

RP: It was right across from the hospital. It would've been, from Block 18 it would've been north of... it was a large garden with ponds, flowing streams...

FH: I don't remember that. I kinda remember in a picture, but I don't visualize it as being there. I might have been, but it didn't stay with, it hadn't stayed with me. But you know, a lot of people fixed their front yard or the area between the two barracks to look like a park. It was amazing what... you know, what you can do in your free time. And they, they'd go up to the -- well, later on you could get out, and they'd get these twigs that look like twigs and they would fix it up and make it look so beautiful.

RP: Did you have that around your barrack, too?

FH: No, we just had a lawn between our barrack, and I don't think there was anybody that was really interested in doing so. I can't... Block 17, I don't remember seeing anything like that, but some other blocks I had seen.

RP: There was a Mr. Kato.

FH: Yeah, he lived in my block. He lived in my block. He went to school with me.

RP: I was wondering if you remember a garden around his barrack.

FH: There might have been, but I can't remember. No, I can't remember.

<End Segment 23> - Copyright © 2009 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.